Banana Sour Cream Pancakes

by Cate on September 15, 2008

First, if you found Sweetnicks from my new column over at the Delish.com website – welcome! Delish.com launched its beta version today and it was fun to finally check out the finished product and see all the deliciousness they’re serving up. If you haven’t heard about it, it’s a new partnership between Hearst and MSN, and is poised to be a great resource for food, recipes, the restaurant scene, celebrity chefs, food reality shows and much, much more. Now on with our regularly scheduled program…

To say Nicholas has been on a major pancake kick lately would be an understatement. Whether for breakfast or a snack, he’s been polishing off quite a lot of them, usually three at a time. His hands-down favorite are Banana Pancakes, a recipe we’ve been making for a few years now. When I serve him a new kind, he usually suspiciously raises an eyebrow before digging in. So far though, we’ve been doing good, and he’s given the thumbs up to Buttermilk Honey Pancakes and now these Banana Sour Cream Pancakes from the Barefoot Contessa.

I’ve been making Ina Garten’s recipes for quite a few years now, and I can’t say I’ve ever had a dud. I like her laid-back style and her recipes are usually effortless and perfect for entertaining, a lazy Sunday breakfast or anything in the middle. Saturday night found Nicholas and I doing a massive reorganization in our basement, which serves as my office and the kids’ playroom. In doing so, we came across a clipping for these pancakes from her Family Style cookbook and as soon as he saw the picture, it became the plan for Sunday’s breakfast.

As I set the plate down in front of him, I told him that this recipe has the bananas just put on the top of the pancakes as they’re cooked; the bananas aren’t mixed in like our usual recipe. I did that from experience … a few weeks ago at a local diner, as the waitress put their version of banana pancakes in front of Nicholas, he wrinkled his nose and told her “Those aren’t banana pancakes! They don’t look like my mom’s.” Mwah!

So prejudice aside, he dug into the stack yesterday. He didn’t polish them off like he usually does, and picked around the bananas in the middle. I asked how he liked them, and he said they were ok, but he liked our other ones better. Me too.

These aren’t bad, by any stretch of the imagination. Quite the contrary. It’s just one of those cases where sometimes when you have a recipe you like, it’s going to take a lot to topple it off its throne. Last week, we got lucky with the mussels, and added another one to our tried-and-true rotation (should mussels and bananas really be in the same post? probably not), but with these banana pancakes, we’re sticking with the one we know and love.

Either way, it’s a great way to start a lazy Sunday. With two kids and countless things going on, I’m not sure we know what a lazy Sunday is anymore … because I’m certain it doesn’t begin at 7 am as ours did, but you can’t go wrong with pancakes on a Sunday. Or any other day for that matter.

Sift together the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. In a separate bowl, whisk together the sour cream, milk, eggs, vanilla, and lemon zest. Add the wet ingredients to the dry ones, mixing only until combined.Melt 1 tablespoon of butter in a large skillet over medium-low heat until it bubbles. Ladle the pancake batter into the pan to make 3 or 4 pancakes. Distribute a rounded tablespoon of bananas on each pancake. Cook for 2 to 3 minutes, until bubbles appear on top and the underside is nicely browned. Flip the pancakes and then cook for another minute until browned. Wipe out the pan with a paper towel, add more butter to the pan, and continue cooking pancakes until all the batter is used. Serve with sliced bananas, butter and maple syrup.